Sarah Palin…Yes Really

Gabriel Rom

The lady hasn’t been out in the political landscape for more than 24 hours and already, she’s being attacked from all sides, this site included. That of course is expected, she’s a 44 year gun-toting, anti abortion hockey mom from Alaska, but even so, the women is more dimensional than many are giving her credit for

Sarah Palin has an 80% approval rating in her home state, but like many Alaskian republicans has not been able to escape some of the corruption investigations that plagues the state’s party. Ironically, this is in part due to Palin’s relentless anti corruption crusades, taking on bigwhigs in the democratic party as well as her own.

You’re absolutely right on the cleansing that’s needed in our party, in the Republican Party.
- Sarah Palin [1]

The woman isn’t all talk though, she cannot and should not be written off just get as an empty dress (see bimbo) that was chosen just to court the evangelical and woman votes. Sarah Palin has taken on one of the most corrupt state parties in the country, she has made bitter enemies, and had to deal with (as of now) unsubstantiated corruption allegations, primarily propagated by the very people she has been trying to convict and/or oust. [2] She had to beat the incumbent republican to achieve her position, running on a moderate ticket for govenor that alienated many republicans, and additionally convinced the Lt.Gov. of Alaska Sean Parnell to jump into the GOP party to beat the incumbent.

Palin has also threatened to support democrats if GOP members wouldn’t support her tax and spend policies. Shes a shrewd, political, no-nonsense type of woman, and not the “beauty queen airhead” many have quickly pigeonholed her as.

That all being said, McCain’s VP choice is a risk, and a huge one at that. Palin does have blaringly obvious political purposes – Women, evangelicals (social conservatives), and McCain needs these votes. Barack Obama is winning this election, in the poll sna din the media, and McCain had to take a risk with his VP. But possibly unforseen by the McCain camp Palin’s pro-life anti-abortion sentiments pose a pandora’s box with voters. She may be able to bring in some hardline conservatives who were having doubts about McCain, but in the meantime she’ll also be losing a swath of liberal Hillary supporters who would have an incredibly hard time voting for a candidate who has a pro-life vp on the ticket.

What all this means for McCain, we will see in the upcoming weeks. I look forward to a Biden-Palin debate. I, and I think a good many others, have a feeling she’ll hold her own much better than the naysayers on left would wish to admit.

Obama/Biden 08′

Gabriel Rom

A secret service detail has been assigned to Joseph Biden early this morning. The 65 year old Deleware senator, Joseph Biden, has been asked to be Barack Obama’s vice presidential nominee – he has accepted.

Biden was Obama’s best choice, and will be an invaluable asset to his campaign. Good choice Barack, you surprised me. Here is NY Times reporter David Brooks take on J.B.:

Working-Class Roots. Biden is a lunch-bucket Democrat. His father was rich when he was young — played polo, cavorted on yachts, drove luxury cars. But through a series of bad personal and business decisions, he was broke by the time Joe Jr. came along. They lived with their in-laws in Scranton, Pa., then moved to a dingy working-class area in Wilmington, Del. At one point, the elder Biden cleaned boilers during the week and sold pennants and knickknacks at a farmer’s market on the weekends.

His son was raised with a fierce working-class pride — no one is better than anyone else. Once, when Joe Sr. was working for a car dealership, the owner threw a Christmas party for the staff. Just as the dancing was to begin, the owner scattered silver dollars on the floor and watched from above as the mechanics and salesmen scrambled about for them. Joe Sr. quit that job on the spot.

Even today, after serving for decades in the world’s most pompous workplace, Senator Biden retains an ostentatiously unpretentious manner. He campaigns with an army of Bidens who seem to emerge by the dozens from the old neighborhood in Scranton. He has disdain for privilege and for limousine liberals — the mark of an honest, working-class Democrat.

Democrats in general, and Obama in particular, have trouble connecting with working-class voters, especially Catholic ones. Biden would be the bridge.

Honesty. Biden’s most notorious feature is his mouth. But in his youth, he had a stutter. As a freshman in high school he was exempted from public speaking because of his disability, and was ridiculed by teachers and peers. His nickname was Dash, because of his inability to finish a sentence.

He developed an odd smile as a way to relax his facial muscles (it still shows up while he’s speaking today) and he’s spent his adulthood making up for any comments that may have gone unmade during his youth.

Today, Biden’s conversational style is tiresome to some, but it has one outstanding feature. He is direct. No matter who you are, he tells you exactly what he thinks, before he tells it to you a second, third and fourth time.

Presidents need someone who will be relentlessly direct. Obama, who attracts worshippers, not just staff members, needs that more than most.

Loyalty. Just after Biden was elected to the senate in 1972, his wife, Neilia, and daughter Naomi were killed in a car crash. His career has also been marked by lesser crises. His first presidential run ended in a plagiarism scandal. He nearly died of a brain aneurism.

New administrations are dominated by the young and the arrogant, and benefit from the presence of those who have been through the worst and who have a tinge of perspective. Moreover, there are moments when a president has to go into the cabinet room and announce a decision that nearly everyone else on his team disagrees with. In those moments, he needs a vice president who will provide absolute support. That sort of loyalty comes easiest to people who have been down themselves, and who had to rely on others in their own moments of need.

Experience. When Obama talks about postpartisanship, he talks about a grass-roots movement that will arise and sweep away the old ways of Washington. When John McCain talks about it, he describes a meeting of wise old heads who get together to craft compromises. Obama’s vision is more romantic, but McCain’s is more realistic.